


Dwarf Lessons

by Samayla



Series: Lemon Meringue AU [2]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Found Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-22
Packaged: 2020-05-13 05:12:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19244530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Samayla/pseuds/Samayla
Summary: In which Thorin gives dwarf lessons to help his little family cope with grief.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Khajimel means "Gift of gifts."

The soft sound of crying disturbed Thorin’s planning. He glanced up from the iron trivet he was sketching to see Bilbo passed out in his arm chair by the fire, exhausted by his grief at last. He paused to listen, and sure enough, there it was again, a quiet sob over the crackling of the fire and his husband’s soft snores.

He sighed and put down his charcoal. He’d hoped their newest addition might sleep a little longer. Mahal knew he needed it, after what he’d been through these past several days, and the funeral that morning had reopened wounds that had just begun to scab over.

Thorin eased the bedroom door open, and in the spill of light from the hallway, he saw little Frodo, curled up in a ball in the very center of the bed, the covers pulled up to his ears.

“What’s wrong, Khajimel?” he asked gently, painfully aware that everything was wrong, and very little of it could be fixed by the likes of him.

“Get up here by me, Uncle Thorin,” the little hobbit squeaked urgently, “before the water sweeps you away too!”

Thorin tried a reassuring smile. “There’s no water in here, Frodo,” he soothed. “Just dry boards and a worn old rug. Just look, and you’ll see.”

But as soon as Thorin sat on the edge of the bed, Frodo jerked the covers over his head and refused to look. Then, afraid of the darkness under the quilt, he uncovered his eyes again. They darted around to all the shadowy corners of the room, everywhere but the floor, and Thorin suspected it was time for the same talk he’d had with Fili and Kili when they were about Frodo’s age. Water under the bed was a great deal like the monsters his nephews had conjured after lights out.

“Are you afraid of the dark, Khajimel?”

“I’m not!”

Thorin’s eyebrows went up at Frodo’s vehemence, but he nodded. Just like Fili and Kili. “Okay then. Nothing to worry about.” He got up again, and ignoring Frodo’s little squeak of protest, he shut the door to the hall, returning the bedroom to full darkness. With his dwarven eyesight, Thorin had no problem seeing, but little Frodo was all but blind.

“Open the door again,” Frodo moaned. “Open it before the water comes back! We’ll drown in the deep dark!”

Thorin took his face in his big, callused hands. “Khajimel,” he said firmly, “calm down. I am here. I would not let you drown.” He waited for Frodo’s breathing to even out, and then the little fauntling was curled against his chest, clinging to the collar of his dressing gown. “Did you know that most dwarves live out their lives in the deep dark of the mountains’ roots?”

“Not a dwarf,” Frodo mumbled into his chest.

“True… but you could pretend.”

Frodo sat up and peered at him skeptically, eyes wide and desperate for any scrap of light. He frowned. “What for?”

“So you wouldn’t have to be afraid, Khajimel.”

“Well, I’m no good at pretend.” Frodo ducked back down to hide his face once more.

“Oh, it’s easy to pretend to be a dwarf,” Thorin said reasonably. “It starts simply enough: are you afraid of your room in the daylight?”

Frodo snorted. “Course not.”

“See? Easy enough to start. You’re not afraid of the dark, and you’re not afraid of your room. You’re half a dwarf already, Khajimel.”

Frodo giggled a little hysterically, but some of the tension left his shoulders. “What’s next?”

“Well, this part is a little trickier. You have to think like a dwarf, and that takes a little practice.” Frodo looked a little put out at that pronouncement, but Thorin caught his chin to regain his focus. “People aren’t really afraid of the dark, you know. They’re afraid of what might be in it — like the water that frightened you just now. But dwarves know something very important: there’s nothing there in the dark that wasn’t there in the light. Does that make sense?”

Frodo shook his head.

“Let me show you.” He got up again and opened the door. “What are you sitting on?”

“The bed,” Frodo said flatly, clearly under the impression that Thorin had lost his mind.

He shut the door. “Now what are you sitting on?”

Frodo giggled again. “Still the bed, of course.”

“Are you sure it’s still the same bed?” Thorin asked. “It’s not made of stone or thistledown or cheese?”

Frodo threw a pillow at him, catching onto the point just a bit quicker than Thorin’s other nephews had. He was a bright little thing. “Still the same, silly!” he squawked. “Blankets and pillows and wood!”

“If you’re sure…” Thorin opened the door again. “How about that nightstand? What’s on it?”

“A candlestick and a doily.”

Thorin shut the door. “Now what’s on it?”

“Still the candlestick and the doily!”

“No turnips?”

“No!”

“No stinky shoes?”

“No!” Frodo laughed, hopping out of bed.

Thorin opened the door. “What are you standing on?”

“The rug!”

Thorin shut the door.

“Still the rug!” Frodo singsonged before Thorin could ask.

“Are you sure it’s not an apple tree?”

“Uncle Thorin!”

He opened the door. “Just checking.”

They continued the game, until Frodo had explored most of the room in the dark. “Dwarves are silly,” he declared at last, after assuring Thorin that there really, truly was no oliphaunt behind the dressing table.

“Most certainly,” Thorin agreed, scooping Frodo into his arms. “But the important part is, you now know how to think like a dwarf. You’re a natural. So, when I shut the door again,” he did so, “and I ask you if there’s any deep water in here now, what are you going to say?”

“Of course not?” Frodo said tentatively.

“You don’t sound very sure of that, little dwarf. Dwarves must be sure.” He opened the door once more. “Is there any deep water in here?”

Frodo looked around. “No.”

Thorin shut the door. “How about now?”

“Still no water!”

“Not even if I put you down on that apple tree where the floor used to be?”

“It’s still the floor, Uncle Thorin!” Frodo squealed as Thorin plopped him down in the middle of the rug in the dark.

“Well, Khajimel?”

There was a pause, and then Frodo leapt to his feet. “No water! Ha! There’s no water!”

Thorin laughed to see his little nephew jumping and singing, that awful weight of dread lifted off his shoulders. Frodo seized his hands and led Thorin in a galloping jig around the rug.

The door opened suddenly behind them, and they both whirled to see Bilbo standing in the doorway, bleary-eyed and confused. “What’s going on in here?” he asked sleepily.

“I’ll tell you about it in the morning,” Thorin said, giving his husband a quick peck on the forehead. “I’m sorry we woke you, Ghivashel. Why don’t you head back to bed? I’ll be in shortly, once I get Frodo settled.”

Bilbo hummed sleepily. “Night, Frodo, my lad,” he murmured, ruffling his hair. His voice was suspiciously thick again, and Thorin suspected tears would soon follow. Thorin squeezed his husband’s shoulder, and Bilbo patted his hand gratefully, then left, closing the door behind him.

Thorin turned to see Frodo already in bed. Thorin joined his nephew, perching on the edge of the mattress once more. “Uncle Thorin,” he said tentatively, “do you think Uncle Bilbo might need dwarf lessons too?”

“What makes you think that, Khajimel?”

Frodo wrinkled his nose in thought. “Well, I thought, since being a dwarf made me not so scared of the dark, maybe it might help Uncle Bilbo not be so scared of… of… well, whatever it is he’s so scared of. I hear him crying sometimes, late at night, or when he thinks he’s alone…” The fauntling’s eyes went wide. “Do you think that’s what he’s scared of, Uncle Thorin?”

“What, Khajimel?”

“Being alone? My mum and dad are gone now, and maybe Uncle Bilbo is scared of being alone, like I was scared of the dark water. But it’s not really real, because I’m a dwarf, and maybe Uncle Bilbo should be a dwarf too, so he knows being alone isn’t really real either. Oh, Uncle Thorin! I’ll bet Uncle Bilbo is great at being a dwarf! He tells such good stories, he’s got to be the best pretender in all of Arda! He—”

“Peace, Khajimel,” Thorin laughed, catching hold of the excited little hobbit before he could topple off the edge of the bed in his haste to start pretending. “That is a great deal of thinking for the wee hours of the morning.”

Frodo bounced in agitation, little arms waving wildly to underscore his point. “We’ve got to help him, Uncle Thorin! It’s so scary being just a little hobbit sometimes! And I know Uncle Bilbo would be a good pretend dwarf! I just know it!”

“Easy, Frodo,” Thorin soothed, worried all the commotion would disturb Bilbo again. “You’re absolutely right: your Uncle Bilbo is the bravest dwarf I’ve ever met.”

“Pretend dwarf,” Frodo corrected, giving Thorin a look like he thought his uncle was not quite keeping up.

“Pretend dwarf,” Thorin amended. “But if you’d seen your uncle, little letter opener in hand, standing alone against Azog the Defiler and a whole pack of Gundabad wargs and their foul riders… Well, Khajimel, you might have mistaken him for a real dwarf, too.”

Frodo’s eyes were wide and round as tea saucers. “You mean out on the Burning Cliffs? Outside Goblin Town?”

Thorin chuckled at the awe in his nephew’s voice. The lad knew the stories almost as well as Thorin did by now. “I do.”

Frodo frowned, nose wrinkling in thought once more. At last, he shook his head. “He must have forgotten, Uncle Thorin. We have to —”

Thorin caught the excitable little fauntling again. “We will, Khajimel,” he assured him. “First thing in the morning.” He stood and pulled the tangle of quilt over Frodo’s legs.

“But—” Frodo tried to shove the quilt off, but Thorin caught it and tucked it up under his chin, pushing him gently but firmly back into the mountain of pillows behind him.

“No buts,” Thorin rumbled. He gave Frodo a very serious look, and the fauntling stopped his squirming. “A case as serious as this one calls for desperate measures. That means a good night’s sleep and a trip down to the market before anything else.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

“This still seems like a stupid, hobbity thing to do,” Frodo grumbled again, giving the ball of dough he was meant to be rolling out a halfhearted whack with the rolling pin.

Uncle Thorin fed another piece of kindling to the fire in the oven and sighed. “Frodo, lad, how many times have you come down to watch me at the forge?”

“Lots,” Frodo mumbled. He set to work on the dough again, sensing the start of a lecture, but Uncle Thorin’s large hand covered Frodo’s and the rolling pin, stopping him.

“Then you know, Khajimel, just like a dwarf knows, that the way things look at the start is rarely the way they look in the end.”

Frodo brightened and nodded eagerly. Sitting by the counter at the forge and guessing what his uncle was making was one of Frodo’s favorite games. There were the obvious projects, like wire whisks and sewing needles, but then there were trickier ones, like the braided iron hooks he made for hanging flower baskets. Those started out like a half a dozen other projects did, with a little block of iron, beaten longer and flatter on the anvil, and it was not until the final hour or so that it became clear what the finished product was to be.

“Do you think I’ve forgotten how to think like a dwarf, Khajimel?”

Frodo shook his head vigorously. Uncle Thorin was the dwarfiest dwarf he knew, aside from Uncle Dwalin, of course. And Uncle Gloin. And his son Gimli. And maybe —

“Have you forgotten then?” Thorin asked, raising one eyebrow and stepping back. He crossed his arms over his chest, leaned against the counter, and just waited.

Frodo shook his head so hard he nearly fell off the chair he was standing on. He peered around at all the items they’d bought that morning at the market, and all the other things his uncle had dragged out of cupboards and cabinets before they set to work making pie crust. Uncle Thorin cooked like he was going to war. All the ingredients lined up, in order of use, across the table. Measuring cups, bowls, spoons, all in neat stacks like regiments in an army. Even the firewood for the oven was sorted by size and stacked close at hand, like a stockpile of emergency provisions.

All that, while very different from the way Frodo had seen any hobbit run a kitchen, did not seem terribly likely to remind Uncle Bilbo to think like a dwarf.

Still, Uncle Thorin waited. Frodo wrinkled his nose and took one more look. There must be some clue, like there always was in their game at the forge, if only Frodo had the wit to see it.

There!

Standing so innocently among the ranks of lemon zest and egg yolk, so normal that anyone could have missed it, was an extra bowl of flour, where Uncle Thorin’s organizational scheme said there ought to be sugar. Frodo pointed. “Doesn’t the recipe say sugar?”

“Aye, it does, Khajimel,” Thorin said with a grin. “Well done.”

And he resumed his fussing with the oven as though nothing at all was wrong.

“But Uncle Thorin —”

“Trust me, Khajimel,” he answered. “Sometimes, the best things come when you break from the recipe.”

Frodo wrinkled his nose, thinking of floury lemon custard. “If you say so…”

Uncle Thorin barked a laugh. “You’ll see. Just keep thinking like a dwarf, Khajimel, and you’ll see.”


	3. Chapter 3

Frodo was not at all sure he liked the idea of calling the thing that Uncle Thorin took out of the oven a pie. It wasn’t even in a pie tin.

Sure, it looked good enough to eat. Frodo could even see the dwarvishness of it now, with the wobbly, interlocking diamonds Uncle Thorin had shown him how to draw in the meringue. But he was not at all sure it classified as any sort of pie, and he was quite certain they should not be feeding it to Uncle Bilbo.

“Khajimel,” Uncle Thorin said over his shoulder, hefting the frying pan full of not-pie onto the kitchen table, “run out to the garden and fetch some pretty flowers or some such for the top. Nothing poisonous, mind!” he added hastily as Frodo scampered out the door, as if any hobbit over the age of four needed such a warning.

Out in the garden, Frodo paused to think, nose wrinkling as he turned a slow circle to take in his options. Flowers on a pie still seemed absurdly hobbity to him. He scrubbed his hands over his face and reminded himself to think like a dwarf. He called up images of every project Uncle Thorin had done, every present Uncle Balin had brought, even the myriad crochet doilies Uncle Ori would send to Uncle Bilbo, folded up in his letters. Those managed to be at once hobbity and dwarvish. Sharp angles. Strong colors. Clean lines.

He opened his eyes and took in the garden once more, seeing it this time in terms of shapes and colors and textures, as he imagined Uncle Thorin would do. Half the blooms, he discarded at once as being too large for the design on the meringue. Several, he passed over as too small and fussy-looking. They reminded him of Aunt Lobelia, and she was about as un-dwarvish as it was possible for a hobbit to be.

Dwarves were adventuresome, fierce, sturdy, so Frodo turned his attention away from the flimsy, fleeting blooms, and took in the greenery that supported them instead. At last, he selected a handful of sharp, narrow peppermint leaves he thought might go well in the diamond-shaped peaks he’d created.

When he presented the leaves to Uncle Thorin, a little breathless from trying to get his entire explanation out in one go, the dwarf merely smiled fondly, ruffled Frodo’s hair, and declared them perfectly dwarvish. Glowing with the praise, Frodo tore out of the kitchen at once to find his other uncle. “Uncle Bilbo! Uncle Bilbo!”

Uncle Bilbo lurched out of his study on stiff legs, dabbing at the corner of his eye with a sleeve and tucking something shiny into his waistcoat pocket as he came. In the stark half-light of the hallway widow, Uncle Bilbo’s face looked rough as tree bark. Frodo halted, alarmed. “What is it, Frodo, my lad?”

Frodo took in the shuffling step and the deep lines beneath his uncle’s reddened eyes and bounded down the hall to seize his hand. “Come on!” he cried, all but towing the bewildered older hobbit down the hall. “Uncle Thorin has a plan! Uncle Thorin!”

Uncle Thorin poked his head out of the kitchen, still clutching an oven mitt in his hand. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s worse than we thought!” Frodo declared. He dragged Uncle Bilbo past Uncle Thorin and into the sunny little breakfast nook beneath the window. “I think he might be an ent,” Frodo hissed. He inspected his uncle’s hairy toes for any sign of roots.

“A what?”

“A tree herder,” Uncle Bilbo supplied, “but I don’t know what’s gotten into—”

“Don’t you see?” Frodo demanded, clutching at Thorin’s shirt tail. “Ents are all alone, so they’re sad and wandered away to become just plain old trees! And just look at Uncle Bilbo! We knew you’d forgotten about being a dwarf — a pretend one — and Uncle Thorin had a plan to remind you, but I don’t think it’s dwarvish enough. It might be too hobbity to work at all — that is, if it doesn’t kill you first — and —”

“Kill me?” Uncle Bilbo interrupted, scooping Frodo up and nestling him in his lap. “Green Lady! My lad, whatever are you talking about?”

“I don’t want an ent for an uncle,” Frodo gasped out, throwing his arms around Bilbo’s neck and burying his face in the collar of his dressing gown.

“Frodo—”

Frodo sat back and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. This was serious, and it was no good if they didn’t take him seriously. He sniffled and gave his uncle a very serious, grown-up sort of look. “Alone isn’t really real, Uncle Bilbo,” he hiccupped by way of explanation. “Just like the water in my room.”

“Water?”

“It wasn’t really real, and Uncle Thorin told me dwarves know things like that, and I thought, if you thought like a dwarf too, you’d know things like that too, and you wouldn’t have to be scared anymore, just like me.”

“I see,” Uncle Bilbo said slowly. “And your Uncle Thorin had a plan, did he?”

Frodo nodded.

“Well, my lad,” Bilbo said, rolling his eyes at Uncle Thorin, which Frodo didn’t think was entirely fair. Sure, his plan was hobbity, but it wasn’t Uncle Thorin’s fault if he was out of practice. Real dwarves were few and far between in the Shire. “The first thing you should know about dwarves, is that they make terrible plans. Awful. Even their best laid plans nearly always turn into something entirely unexpected. So, if you’re going to be thinking like a dwarf from now on, you must remember that the plan is only the beginning, and you mustn’t be alarmed by whatever comes after.”

Frodo turned to look at Uncle Thorin, who looked a little embarrassed by Uncle Bilbo’s speech, but not ready to argue with it. “Like you said about recipes?” Frodo asked.

“Just like, Khajimel,” Uncle Thorin rumbled, hoisting Frodo out of Uncle Bilbo’s arms and up onto his shoulder.

“Recipes, eh?” Uncle Bilbo asked shrewdly. “Is this one very likely to kill me then?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Uncle Thorin teased. “Terrible planner that I am, anything could happen — but you mustn’t be alarmed.”

Frodo squirmed until Uncle Thorin let him down. “It won’t kill you, Uncle Bilbo,” he assured him with a great deal more confidence than he felt. “I mean, it’s all pie ingredients, isn’t it? Aside from the leaves on top, I mean.”

“Leaves on top… How very dwarvish.”

“I thought so,” Frodo agreed. “Better than any frilly flowers. These ones are sharp and study, and when you walk into a room, you notice them.”

“Just like a dwarf.” Frodo suspected Uncle Bilbo might be teasing him too, but he was too relieved to see a smile on his uncle’s face to mind overmuch. “So, my lad,” Bilbo asked, “where are we to find this pie?”

“Not-a-pie,” Frodo corrected. He turned eagerly to the counter, but found it empty of everything but a light dusting of flour. “Where is it?” he demanded.

“Outside, of course,” Uncle Thorin answered, “where all the most dwarvish of adventures take place.”

Frodo hooted his approval and launched himself out into the back garden. Laughter behind him told him his uncles were both close behind.

 

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

Frodo all but lay on the picnic table in the back garden, scrutinizing the not-a-pie as he turned it this way and that. Thorin had gone back inside to fetch a pie server, and Frodo had not said a single word since he’d left, other than to insist that the thing on the table was not a pie.

“Well, Frodo, my lad?” Bilbo whispered. He rested his chin on his folded arms so he shared his nephew’s eye-level view of the offending dessert. “What’s the verdict?”

“I wouldn’t really eat it if I was you,” Frodo whispered back. He sat up suddenly and glanced around the garden. “Don’t tell Uncle Thorin I said that though.”

Bilbo sat up very seriously and put a finger to his lips. “Our secret then, my lad.”

Frodo grinned. “Thanks, Uncle Bilbo.”

“Found it,” Thorin announced, striding back into the garden and scattering butterflies off the lavender that grew beside the path.

“Get lost, did you?” Bilbo teased.

“No,” Thorin sniffed. “But it did occur to me how wildly irresponsible it would be to eat pie before at least second breakfast, so I brought provisions.” He shook a worn old pack at them. “Come on then. Deeper into the Wild!”

Thorin led the way, wielding the pie server like a sword, stomping and clomping his heavy boots to raise a racket. Little Frodo hopped along after him, trying in vain to pin down the dwarf’s shadow. Bilbo brought up the rear with the not-a-pie, content to observe. Thorin was so at-ease with younglings. He’d had plenty of experience in helping to raise Fili and Kili. But Bilbo couldn’t help but worry. Frodo had always been a frequent visitor to Bag End when his parents were alive, but now… As Lobelia was constantly reminding him, now it was for real.

“Come on, Ghivashel,” Thorin rumbled from up ahead. “The lad says this cave is free of orcs.”

Bilbo smiled and hurried to catch up. He eyed the patch of sunshine behind the old oak skeptically. “I don’t know… Did you search to the back?” he asked. He hunched over the frying pan as if prepared to defend the not-a-pie with his life if necessary.

Thorin turned in mock seriousness to Frodo. “He makes a fair point, Khajimel. Caves in these mountains are seldom unoccupied.”

Frodo giggled and flopped down into the grass. “It’s fine,” he assured them, waving his arms through the long blades. “No trap doors or anything. Come on!”

But all was not fine. All through their meal of apples, cheese, and waybread, Frodo’s eyes kept sliding back to the not-a-pie lying innocently beside Thorin. Finally, Bilbo decided he’d had enough of torturing the poor lad with waiting. “Well, Thorin,” he said at last, “I don’t know what you’ve done to this pie to get the lad so worried, but I suppose we’d best get on with it. But if it does kill me, I’m entrusting you, Frodo, my lad, with the silverware. Not a piece of it is to go to your Aunt Lobelia, no matter how she may bleat about it. Not one single teaspoon.”

Frodo swallowed hard. “Yes, Uncle.”

The pie was beautiful, as always, even if the stink of warm peppermint was making his eyes water. The slice Thorin cut for him came out of the pan looking like a thick, fudgy cake, but for the rich yellow color. Bilbo realized at once that Thorin must have switched out flour for the sugar this time. If that was the worst of it, he’d count himself lucky.

“Would you like a piece, Khajimel?”

Frodo shook his head at Thorin, though his wide eyes were glued to Bilbo’s plate.

Bilbo shrugged, an evil plan taking shape in his mind. “More for me, I suppose.” He took an enormous bite. It was heavy and sour, and the mint-spiked meringue gave the whole thing a faintly medicinal taste, like tonic chased with a spoonful of sugar.

In short, it was terrible.

But Bilbo had riddled with monsters in the dark roots of mountains — which he supposed was a very dwarvish thought indeed — and so it was easy to paste on a cheery smile, declare it marvelous, and take another bite.

Surprised but gratified, Thorin took a bite of his own slice, only to be overcome by a sudden coughing fit. He choked the bite down after a minute. Catching on almost at once to Bilbo’s plot, he quickly assured Frodo it was only a bit of peppermint leaf, swallowed the wrong way. However, the coward then busied himself with topping off their cups of cider to avoid taking a second bite.

Frodo looked skeptical, until Bilbo took yet another bite, and Thorin steeled himself and reached for his own plate with a horribly false grin. But Frodo, who could only see a treat he might be missing out on, snatched up Thorin’s fork and shoved a massive bite of not-a-pie into his mouth.

His eyes went wide, then began to water, and then he spat the whole, huge glob out into the grass.

“That’s terrible!”

Bilbo joined in Thorin’s roar of laughter while Frodo guzzled two of the three cups of cider to try and be rid of the taste. “Frodo, my lad,” he panted, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes, “I do believe I am quite cured of any entishness now.”

“Really?” Frodo choked. He snagged Bilbo’s cup and drained it too, grimacing at the lingering taste of lemon and mint. “Do you remember how to be a dwarf then, Uncle Bilbo?”

“Indeed I do, my boy. Indeed I do.”

“Dwarves love pranks,” Thorin assured the lad, when he still looked concerned.

Bilbo flicked a puff of meringue at his husband. “Aye, but with their particular gift for planning, they often get caught up in the joke themselves. Honestly, Thorin,” he exclaimed at his affronted look. “I can see where Kili gets it now! Comes by it honestly, the poor lad!”

“I don’t know how you kept such a straight face,” Thorin sniffed.

“Three bites,” Frodo agreed with a shudder.

“It was worth every one to see the looks on your faces,” Bilbo declared. He flung another bit of meringue off his fork like a catapult.

Frodo squealed as Thorin used him as a shield.

The food fight that ensued was very dwarvish indeed.


End file.
